The album was recorded before the band left Australia for London in 1980, at which point they changed their name to The Birthday Party and created the body of work for which they are most recognised.

Shortly afterwards, Rowland S. Howard joined as second guitarist and the group discarded half of these songs and recorded five new tracks in January 1979.

[2] Vocalist Nick Cave later said of the album, "We were adolescents and very late developers.

It reeks of a band trying to be musically intelligent and write clever, witty lyrics.

Written by Howard, "Shivers" was later covered by Marie Hoy, The Screaming Jets, Divine Fits, Courtney Barnett, and others.